What About Us

Amidst plenty we grope like scavengers Like orphans with no descent Like clothe sellers wearing rags Or meat vendors feasting only on bones Had I no inheritance or birthright? Had I only crumbs off the master’s table Or no returns for my daylong drudgery? But mother said we were rich Her breasts alone feed and power the world From day break till set of sun We plough and sink in our seeds And watch in marvel As seeming lifeless earth blooms in kinds Only to wake to harvest with sundry queries Where is the nectar of our field? Where are the golden eggs laid at dusk? ‘When men slept…,’ they say The barns were emptied abroad Stored up for the unborn What about us the living What about us, who dare the sun And till the ground with blistered hands The hens are scrawny with soiled grains And soon may no longer yield golden eggs